My First Time Battling Boxelder Bugs

Here's when I think are bad times to buy a house.

• When you can't really afford one
• When interest rates are super high
• During any hunting season
• In the middle of winter

You can maybe add this one to the list? The peak of the boxelder bug season.

My family and I moved back home to Minnesota after being gone for almost 15 years. We had to get an apartment right away, but we always had planned on getting a house within the first year or two.

Unfortunately, it was the TWO part of that one to two -- but fortunately, it did happen. My wife and I just bought our 2nd home together (first in Minnesota). And we are happy that we are finally paying a mortgage payment and not a rent payment.

Being homeowners again, and back in Minnesota, we are quickly learning (or remembering) things that many homeowners here deal with.

One of those things is the pesky and numerous (but not harmful) boxelder bugs. And we timed our move right when their numbers were multiplying at an insect type rate -- very fast and very furious. I have experienced them before but never has a homeowner.

So given that we both working our full-time jobs, trying to unpack and organize everything, deal with teenager issues, clean that apartment we lived in, and address issues in the new house we are just discovering -- you know, those things you only find out after you buy (more on that later). We did not address this issue as soon as we should have.

We did notice the boxelder bugs almost immediately and we made a note to deal with them ASAP. Which, as it turned out, was the following weekend after we moved in -- and which also turned out to be at least 4-5 days too late.

I don't say too late to mean it's out of control, and the bugs have taken over the house and kicked us out. I mean that those fast-breeding things seem to have multiplied tenfold.

So how do you get rid of these annoying things? A few people told me that dish soap and water does the trick. Hmm, I thought. That's it? Yeah, it turns out that's it - sort of. It depends how early you get into the game, and has I said -- we got in late.

The dish soap/water solution is working great. But since it's my first time using this method, I've been learning something things. You can mix the water/soap in a spray bottle for smaller areas like trees and walls of your house. But for large areas:

Get a 5-gallon bucket, and squeeze dish soap in it.

 Spray hose so it gets nice and foamy. 

Pour into large areas around the house. Such as rock beds.

Here's a video you can check out to deal with boxelder bugs more thoroughly.